Eliza slept badly.
Every time she drifted off, she saw Caleb standing above her.
Sometimes he carried the skillet.
Sometimes her mother’s locket.
Sometimes he had Rowan’s face.
She woke before dawn with a strangled cry and instinctively tried to sit up.
Pain stabbed through her ribs.
A chair scraped the floor.
Rowan appeared from the corner of the cabin, fully dressed except for his boots.
“Easy.”
Eliza shrank away.
Rowan stopped.
The fire had burned low, leaving the cabin dim and orange.
“I’m not coming closer.”
Her breathing slowly settled.
Rowan pointed toward a tin cup on the bedside table.
“Water.”
Eliza drank.
The first swallow hurt.
The second felt like life returning.
She finished half the cup before noticing something beside it.
Her locket.
Rowan had placed it there.
He had not taken it.
That mattered.
“Why were you sleeping in a chair?” she asked.
Rowan glanced toward the narrow second bed against the opposite wall.
“Didn’t figure waking up beside a strange man would improve your morning.”
Despite herself, Eliza almost smiled.
Almost.
Then she remembered.
“Jonathan Whitmore.”
Rowan’s face hardened slightly.
“Yes.”
“You said he was my father.”
“He was.”
“You can’t know that.”
“I can.”
“How?”
Rowan pulled on his boots.
He moved slowly, perhaps understanding that sudden movements still frightened her.
“I worked for him.”
“You?”
“Long time ago.”
“How long?”
“I was nineteen when Jonathan Whitmore hired me.”
Eliza studied Rowan’s face.
He appeared close to fifty.
That would fit.
“What kind of work?”
“Whatever paid. Breaking horses. Fixing fence. Hunting wolves. Running cattle over Georgia Pass.”
“My mother never mentioned a ranch.”
“That doesn’t surprise me.”
Eliza’s eyes narrowed.
“What does that mean?”
Rowan sat.
“It means somebody went to a great deal of trouble to bury the Whitmore name.”
The cabin became very quiet.
“Start at the beginning.”
Rowan rubbed his beard.
“You should rest.”
“No.”
“Your ribs—”
“I spent twenty-seven years believing Daniel Mercer was my father.”
Her voice cracked.
“And yesterday my husband tried to kill me. So please don’t tell me I should rest.”
Rowan absorbed that without argument.
“Caleb’s your husband?”
Eliza hated the shame that rose inside her.
“Yes.”
“How long?”
“Three years.”
“Mercer his name?”
“No. Rusk.”
“Caleb Rusk.”
Something flickered in Rowan’s eyes.
“You know him?”
“Know of him.”
That frightened her.
“What have you heard?”
“Enough.”
Eliza looked away.
The old humiliation returned.
Everyone always seemed to know before she admitted it herself.
Rowan surprised her.
“I’m not asking what he did to you.”
She looked back.
“That’s yours to say when you’re ready.”
Tears burned her eye.
She blinked them away.
“Tell me about Jonathan.”
Rowan leaned forward, forearms resting on his knees.
“Jonathan Whitmore came west from Missouri in 1857. Made some money freighting supplies, then bought land along Jefferson Creek. Good grass. Better water.”
“A ranch?”
“More than that eventually. Cattle. Timber rights. Part ownership in a silver claim.”
Eliza shook her head.
“My mother died poor.”
“I know.”
“How?”
“That’s the part I never understood.”
Rowan looked toward the fire.
“Jonathan married Miriam Bell in 1858. You were born two years later.”
Eliza’s hand moved unconsciously to the locket.
“1860.”
Rowan nodded.
“That’s my birth year.”
“Yes.”
Eliza swallowed.
“What happened?”
“War came.”
The word hung heavily.
“Jonathan volunteered. Didn’t stay gone long. Bad wound near Glorieta. Came back limping.”
Rowan’s voice became quieter.
“By then, another man had started handling the ranch books. Daniel Mercer.”
Eliza stared.
“My father.”
“Your stepfather.”
She pressed her lips together.
Rowan continued.
“Mercer was educated. Good with numbers. Jonathan trusted him.”
“Mother married Daniel.”
“After Jonathan died.”
“How?”
“Official story was a stable fire.”
Eliza felt something crawl along her spine.
“Official?”
“I wasn’t there the night it happened. I’d ridden south after work with a cattle drive.”
Rowan looked at his hands.
“When I came back, the house was half burned. Jonathan was dead. Everybody said you died too.”
“My mother?”
“Gone.”
“Gone where?”
“Nobody knew.”
Eliza tried to process it.
“So you believed I was dead.”
“For twenty-seven years.”
“And Mother married Daniel Mercer.”
“Apparently.”
Rowan stood and walked to a shelf.
He removed a small wooden box.
From inside, he took a folded piece of cloth.
He returned and placed it on the table.
Eliza watched him open it.
Inside lay a tarnished brass object.
A branding iron head no larger than a man’s palm.
Three stars over a pine tree.
The same symbol on her locket.
Eliza stared.
“That was Whitmore’s mark,” Rowan said.
She reached for her locket.
The design matched exactly.
Her stomach turned.
“Why do you have that?”
“Jonathan gave it to me.”
“Why?”
Rowan’s jaw moved.
“He thought somebody was stealing from him.”
“Daniel?”
“He never said.”
“But you suspected him.”
“Later.”
Eliza studied the branding mark.
Suddenly a memory stirred.
A kitchen.
Her mother leaning over a table.
A paper burning in the stove.
Daniel Mercer shouting in another room.
Eliza had been five or six.
Her mother had grabbed her shoulders and whispered, If anyone asks, you have always been a Mercer.
Eliza had forgotten that moment.
Or forced herself to.
Her breathing quickened.
“Mother knew.”
Rowan leaned forward.
“What?”
“She told me once that I had always been a Mercer.”
“That sound strange to you now?”
“Yes.”
“Anything else?”
Eliza closed her eye.
Memories floated up like debris after a flood.
Daniel forbidding questions.
Her mother crying over letters she never mailed.
A man coming to their house when Eliza was nine.
He had called her “Miss Whit—”
Daniel struck him before he could finish.
The visitor disappeared.
Eliza whispered, “Someone came looking for us.”
“When?”
“I was a child.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
Rowan’s eyes sharpened.
“What happened?”
“Daniel threw him out.”
She looked at Rowan.
“I remember Mother crying afterward.”
Rowan stood abruptly.
“What?”
“You know who it was?”
“Maybe.”
He walked to the window.
Outside, dawn turned the mountains pale silver.
“My brother Elias went searching for Miriam.”
Eliza stared.
“You had a brother?”
“Had.”
“What happened?”
“He disappeared.”
“When?”
Rowan’s shoulders stiffened.
“About twenty years ago.”
Eliza’s pulse quickened.
“How old would I have been?”
“Seven.”
The silence turned heavy.
Rowan faced her.
“Close to the age you just described.”
Eliza felt sick.
“Do you think Daniel killed him?”
“I don’t know.”
“You think he might have.”
“Yes.”
A floorboard creaked as Rowan shifted.
Eliza looked toward the door.
For the first time she noticed a heavy wooden bar across it.
“Are you expecting someone?”
Rowan followed her gaze.
“Maybe.”
“Caleb?”
“He left you for dead, stole your money, and knows somebody might find the body.”
Eliza’s throat tightened.
“He’ll come back.”
“Most likely.”
Fear surged.
“We have to leave.”
“You can barely stand.”
“I don’t care.”
“I do.”
“You don’t understand him.”
Rowan’s expression changed.
“You think I’m afraid of Caleb Rusk?”
“No. That’s the problem.”
Eliza pulled the blanket tighter.
“Men always think violence is simple when they’re stronger.”
Rowan said nothing.
She continued.
“Caleb doesn’t fight fair. He smiles. He lies. He tells everyone you attacked him first. He makes people doubt what they saw.”
Rowan’s gaze remained steady.
“He convinced the sheriff once that I fell down our stairs.”
“Did you?”
“No.”
“I figured.”
Eliza looked at him.
“So if he comes here and you threaten him, he’ll run to town and tell everyone you kidnapped me.”
Rowan considered this.
“You’re right.”
She blinked, surprised.
No man in her life had ever admitted that so easily.
“What do we do?”
“First, we get you well enough to ride.”
“And then?”
“We find proof.”
“Of what?”
Rowan glanced at the Whitmore brand.
“Who you are.”
Eliza felt a bitter laugh rise.
“What difference does a dead family name make?”
“Depends.”
“On what?”
“On whether the Whitmore property still exists.”
She stared at him.
“What property?”
“Most was broken up after the fire.”
“Then it’s gone.”
“Maybe.”
Rowan opened the wooden box again.
This time he removed a yellowed page.
The paper was cracked along the folds.
He handed it to Eliza.
She struggled to read the faded handwriting.
It was an old property record.
At the bottom was a description of eighty acres along a creek.
And a clause.
To pass to the lawful issue of Jonathan Whitmore upon proof of survival.
Eliza read the sentence twice.
“What does that mean?”
“It means part of the property couldn’t legally be sold if you were alive.”
“Who owns it now?”
“That’s what I don’t know.”
She looked at him.
“Why would anyone care about eighty acres?”
Rowan took the document back.
“Because Jefferson Creek changed.”
“How?”
“Railroad survey.”
Her stomach sank.
“And?”
“Word is they’re looking at a route through the valley.”
Money.
Enough money to kill for.
Eliza suddenly remembered Caleb.
Not drunk.
Not angry.
Calm.
Three weeks earlier.
Standing in their kitchen.
Holding her mother’s Bible.
Asking questions.
Did your mother ever own land?
At the time, Eliza had thought it strange.
Then he began searching trunks.
Drawers.
Her sewing basket.
The lining of her reticule.
“Oh, God.”
Rowan was beside her but did not touch her.
“What?”
“He knew.”
“Knew what?”
“Something about the land.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
Eliza squeezed her eye shut.
“He kept asking about papers my mother might have left.”
“What papers?”
“She left a Bible. Letters. Nothing important.”
“Where are they?”
“At our house.”
Rowan’s expression darkened.
“That’s a problem.”
“No.”
Eliza opened her eye.
“It’s an opportunity.”
Rowan frowned.
“You’re not going back there.”
“I didn’t say I was.”
“Good.”
“You are.”
“No.”
Eliza almost laughed.
“You said I got to choose.”
“You get to choose for yourself.”
“And I choose to ask you.”
“That’s different.”
“How?”
“Because sending me into another man’s house to steal papers sounds like a poor way to repay a rescue.”
“They’re mine.”
“That changes the wording. Not the risk.”
Eliza leaned back against the pillow.
“Rowan.”
He sighed.
“What?”
“Please.”
He stared at her for a long time.
Finally he muttered something under his breath.
“What was that?”
“I said Jonathan Whitmore had the same look when he was about to talk me into something stupid.”
For the first time since the ravine, Eliza truly smiled.
It hurt her ribs.
But she smiled anyway.
Then came a sound outside.
Rowan’s smile vanished.
A horse.
Not theirs.
Approaching quickly.
Rowan grabbed the Henry rifle.
Eliza’s blood turned cold.
The horse stopped near the cabin.
A man shouted from outside.
“Creed!”
Eliza knew the voice.
Her hand flew to her mouth.
Caleb.
“Rowan Creed! I know you’re in there!”
Rowan moved toward the window.
Eliza whispered, “Don’t let him see me.”
Rowan gave one short nod.
Caleb shouted again.
“I’m looking for my wife!”
Rowan looked at Eliza.
The fear in her face must have told him everything.
Outside, Caleb’s voice changed.
Smoother now.
Almost concerned.
“She’s hurt, Creed. Confused. Dangerous to herself.”
Eliza shook her head furiously.
Rowan’s mouth hardened.
Caleb continued.
“If you found her, you need to bring her home.”
Rowan slowly chambered a round.
Then he glanced back at Eliza.
Not asking whether he should protect her.
Asking what she wanted.
Eliza met his eyes.
And whispered the first decision of her new life.
“Tell him I’m dead.”